


Primary

by turingtestflunker



Series: Checks and Balances [1]
Category: The West Wing
Genre: BDSM, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Boss/Employee Relationship, Face Slapping, First Time, Hair-pulling, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Oral Sex, Power Imbalance, Silence Kink, Subspace, Top Drop, Verbal Abuse, Verbal Humiliation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 14:03:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5747203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turingtestflunker/pseuds/turingtestflunker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Companion piece to the episode "Opposition Research". Matt and Josh find an unorthodox way of resolving their personal differences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Primary

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the same universe as Brokered. Un-beta-ed so please excuse any errors I missed.

It’s official. One hundred percent. Santos is going to put it in his platform and if by some series of vanishingly unlikely events he ever becomes President, he’ll put it in an executive order on day one: New Hampshire is too damn cold for human habitation. There’s no good reason for cold like this.

Josh tried to tell him, on the plane, “Congressman,” he’d said, “It’s only fair to warn you: the weather in New Hampshire is going to try to murder you. Possibly in your sleep, it does that. Lets you think you’re all warm in your bed, and then when you wake up  **BOOM** frozen solid”

Santos had laughed and said, “It can’t be that bad, and Josh, and for the fifth time, call me Matt”

Josh had sucked a breath of air through his teeth in a way that Santos was soon to learn meant he was barely repressing the urge to shout at someone. Matt has become intimately familiar with the sound. It’s more or less the soundtrack to his campaign. 

And that’s why he’s here, isn’t it? Freezing his ass off outside the door of Josh’s motel room, about to do something colossally stupid. That growing tension between them that should’ve been resolved on the lawn outside Hawk’s house, but somehow  _ wasn’t _ . The creeping desire to push his campaign manager to the ground and beat some sense into him, to  _ make him listen _ , which Santos could’ve ignored if the thought of it didn’t make him achingly hard.

He shouldn’t do this. It’s stupid, sordid, perverse and potentially criminal. He should turn around and go back to his room and try to shove this mess back into whatever dark pit it crawled out of. But if Santos was good at saying no to terrible ideas he knows he’ll regret, then he wouldn’t be in fucking New Hampshire, would he?

Before he can lose his nerve, Matt knocks on the door.

“WHO in the name of ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY dares disturb me at this UNGODLY FUCKING HOUR?!”... well, at least Matt knows he has the right room.

“Josh? It’s me” he calls back, trying not alert the rest of the motel.

Matt hears the rustling of papers, an ominous sounding thud, and several expletives. A moment later, Josh opens the door.

“Shit, Congressman, I’m sorry. I just… wasn’t expecting anyone” Josh looks like hell. He’s still wearing his work clothes, but they’re in such disarray that it looks like they’re trying to escape from him. 

Matt steps inside the room and closes the door behind him, “Hey, don’t worry about it. I know it’s late, but, uh if you could tone that sort of thing down in front of the new volunteers before they start dropping dead from sheer terror, that’d be great”

“Yeah, sure, uh… Is there something you need, or...” Josh runs a hand through his hair and looks at the floor. 

Matt looks around the room, “It looks like a file cabinet exploded in here. Are you still working? Or do you just sort of...nest in this stuff?”

Josh is sucking air through his teeth and Matt thinks he sees a vein pulsing on Josh’s forehead, “Have you even been listening to me the last six weeks?! You should, because believe it or not there’s actual  _ content _ in there, important stuff, not in fact pulled out of my ass!” Josh gesticulates wildly at his warzone of a motel room, “You think listening to me talk sucks? Try wading through this fucking ocean of bullshit!”

There it is. This is what Matt came for. He catches Josh’s wrist in the middle of a particularly sweeping dramatic gesture and pulls him close.

“Congressman?!” Josh looks surprised, but not disgusted or afraid.

He  _ really  _ doesn’t want Josh to call him that right now, “Call me Matt” 

“Congressman, I told you…” Josh starts, apparently ready to keep arguing, but not trying to pull away or break Matt’s hold on his wrist.

Matt kisses him, all brute force and sharp teeth. He’s more than half-expecting a punch in the face or a scream for help. Instead, Josh just opens his mouth and  _ takes  _ it. 

Matt pulls away. They’re both breathing hard. 

“You’ve got 10 seconds to tell me to get out of here” Matt says, trying hard to keep his voice level.

Josh shakes his head, “No… I don’t think I’m gonna do that.”

Matt kisses him again, shoves him forward, towards the middle of the room, and then down, onto his his knees. Josh is looking up at him. Matt doesn’t know what comes next. Whoever sent him this burning hunger in his gut, this crawling feeling under his skin, wasn’t kind enough to enclose a damned manual.

“Hit me” Josh whispers softly, looking at the ground.

“What?!” He’s been wanting it for weeks, but everything in Santos rebels at the idea. It’s wrong to hit a man on his knees. It’s wrong to hit someone who works for you. It’s wrong to hit someone that you were kissing not thirty seconds ago. And this… this is a new, complicated, multilayered kind of wrong that Matt didn’t even know existed.

“Hit me” Josh says again, louder this time, and staring him straight in the eye. God help him, Matt wants to.

“ _ Please _ ” Josh says, and that does it. Matt tugs his Annapolis class ring off his finger and slips it into his pocket. 

He hits him, open handed, right across the cheekbone. Josh lets out a long broken moan. Matt is frozen for a second, he can’t believe he actually did that, but then Josh is clasping his hands behind his back and tilting his face upward to make himself an easier target. He’s looking at Matt like he’s the only thing in the world. Matt hits him again. Once, twice, three times. He’s astonished at how good it feels. When he’s done, Josh has a blooming red mark on his cheek, tears running down his face, and a raging hard on straining against his pants. He looks up at Matt, his mouth slightly open, perfectly silent and perfectly still. 

Matt’s hands shake as he undoes his pants and takes out his cock. He looks down at Josh, who looks almost drunk and who hasn’t said a word since ‘please’. He takes his dick in one hand and a handful of Josh’s hair in the other.

“You’re going to suck me off now, do you understand?” Matt says, surprised at how rough his own voice sounds. 

Josh nods as emphatically as he can with Matt’s grip on his hair.

“Tell me you want it!” Matt growls, louder than he meant to. He needs to hear it.

“...w-want it.  _ Please _ ” Josh mutters. 

_ Jesus Christ, that word will be the death of me,  _ Matt thinks as he slides into Josh’s mouth. Josh tries to take it all at once, tries to gag himself on Matt’s cock. Matt doesn’t let him, makes him take it an inch at a time, slow and easy. 

“Goddamnit, Josh” Matt groans, “I wish I had known this was all I had to do to make you sit down and shut up”

Josh moans around Matt’s cock.

“What? You like that, huh? Like it when I tell you what a pain in the ass you are?” he asks. Josh is reaching down to touch himself, which Matt takes as a  _ yes _ .

“Christ, you’re good at this. You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” Matt is fucking Josh’s face faster now, his knuckles creak from the death grip he has on Josh’s hair. 

Josh fumbles to open his pants and begins jerking off frantically. 

“Oh god… do you get on your knees for all your candidates? Is that why everyone wants to hire you? I bet there was a line around the block once word got out what your mouth is  _ really  _ good for. Fucking whore... _ goddamnit”  _ Matt comes down Josh’s throat with a muffled shout.

Matt lets go of Josh’s hair and pulls out of his mouth. Josh is crying harder than he was when Matt was hitting him, the mark on his cheek has darkened and spread, and he’s fucking his fist like his life depends on it. He looks utterly  _ ruined _ . Matt watches Josh gasp and groan his way to orgasm. Josh looks him in the eye the whole time. 

When it’s over Josh lets himself collapse into a heap on the floor. Matt wonders if he really did  _ break  _ him. The twisted logic that had governed this thing has shattered and Matt is left standing with his cock out, looking down at the man he just… he has no idea what’s supposed to happen now. He hadn’t planned to be the kind of candidate who needed a plan for what to do after assaulting his campaign manager. 

Josh coughs, mutters something unintelligible, and says, as calmly as if he were hustling Matt out of an event that had run too long, “Congressman, it’s time for you to go”

At a loss for words, Matt does up his pants and goes.

***

The next morning Santos half expects Josh to be gone, but he isn’t. He’s buzzing around with a brutal looking bruise on his face, harassing Ned and Ronna and terrorizing the volunteers. He overhears Josh grudgingly admitting to Ronna that he got the bruise by tripping over his suitcase and falling on his face on the way to take a piss. Santos has to admit that it sounds like exactly the sort of thing Josh would do.

Later that day, Santos finds a matchbook in his briefcase. Inside, scrawled in Josh’s messy handwriting is  _ Try to keep it below the collar next time. Also, burn this _ . As if writing the note in a matchbook weren’t hint enough. Santos rips out one of the matches and sets it alight, lets it flare and burn itself out on the icy ground.

He looks around to see if anyone had been watching. He spots Josh looking at him from a distance, smiling wryly. Just one more part of the process that Santos doesn’t understand. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that Matt and Josh have no idea what they're doing. Don't try this at home unless you know what you're doing. Face slapping is potentially serious business. Anyway, thanks for reading. I have lots of ideas for this timeline already, but please feel free to post requests in the comments.


End file.
